


Paging Doctor Gottlieb

by davecabbage



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Chuck Lives, Disability, Friendship, Gen, Physical Disability, Self-Hatred, Survivor Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-12
Updated: 2015-07-12
Packaged: 2018-04-08 23:10:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4324374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/davecabbage/pseuds/davecabbage
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chuck finds an unlikely source of comfort and support in the form of Hermann Gottlieb after coming back from Pitfall with life-altering injuries.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paging Doctor Gottlieb

**Author's Note:**

> Written for tumblr user [3fluffies](http://3fluffies.tumblr.com/) who was in need of some fluff, but well I'm not sure that this actually qualifies... 
> 
> I'm sorry, this was all I could write.

He would never pilot a Jaeger again. Not that that was an issue considering the breach was sealed and the war was over. There wasn’t a single Jaeger left intact anyway. But it was just one of the many things that he would never do again.

Chuck should have been dead. It was a miracle he was even alive. Despite his claim of wanting to come back from the final mission, he had been fully prepared to die. His fate was all but sealed when he saw Pentecost walk through that door in his old drive suit. They both knew it. His dad knew he was sending his son off to die. In a way Chuck had always known that that was how it was all going to end for him. He’d never really envisioned a life after the war. Not many people did, but that was down to the despair when facing what seemed like unbeatable odds. For Chuck, it was the life of a soldier. The life of a child thrust into a war and forced to grow up before his time. Forced to die before his life had really begun. He lived and breathed this life and he was supposed to die in it too.

He should have been vaporised at the bottom of the ocean. A ranger didn’t abandon their co-pilot. It just wasn’t done. The very essence of the rangers was that they were in this together, until the very end. They went down with their ship and they did it together. Pentecost didn’t see it that way apparently. The man really was a master of controlling the drift. Chuck didn’t know his life had been saved until it was too late when Pentecost had overridden Striker’s controls and initiated his escape pod. The man was many things – a leader, warrior, hero – but in the end Stacker Pentecost was above all a father. And he spared the life of his closest friend’s son.

Part of Chuck resented Pentecost for that. There was nothing worse than a ranger abandoning his co-pilot. He hadn’t wanted to, but going out in a blaze of glory wouldn’t have been a bad way to go. He could have honestly said that he had lived a full life, as short as it may have been, and did the right thing in the end.

Chuck would never pilot a Jaeger again, but that wasn’t an issue anymore. He would never run again. Just getting on his feet and walking again had been an almost unachievable feat in itself. The real resentment he felt towards his fallen co-pilot laid in the life he had returned to.

The fact that they had pulled his bruised and bloody body from that escape pod and he had lived should have been enough to make anyone believe in miracles, or that life truly could be good to some people, or some other sentimental feel-good bullshit like that. But it didn’t. Not in the aftermath. It had been touch and go there for a while, but Chuck Hansen was a fighter and a stubborn bastard on top of that. He lived. He survived something that he shouldn’t have.

Still, that wasn’t to say that he had gotten off lightly either. His body had been riddled with a lot of broken bones, fractures and internal bleeding, but it was his legs that suffered the worst of it. The left one was broken in several places but all that would eventually heal with time. The right one on the other hand was damaged almost beyond repair. It wasn’t so far gone as to warrant amputation – although Chuck didn’t see the point in keeping the damn thing anyway after what had been done to it – but it was broken enough to be left weakened and crippled for the rest of Chuck’s life. A span of time he had never truly believed would have been extended this long. He should’ve been grateful, but he never asked for this second chance at life. It wasn’t a life. Not really.

But Chuck hadn’t been given a choice in the matter.  They both knew that he would have refused, and argued until it was too late. So Pentecost didn’t give him the option. The decision was made for him and now he had to live with that. He wondered if Pentecost would’ve made the same choice if he had known what the future had in store for the former Ranger.

No was not a word Chuck Hansen had ever let dominate his life. By all rights he should’ve still been confined to the wheelchair 24/7 that the doctor had forced on him. It was the compromise they had made to get him the hell out of that damned bed back in medical. Months and months spent lying on his back. There was only so much TV he could watch and only so many books he could read. It wasn’t even the solitude; he’d shunned all visitors with the exception of the old man. He just needed to _move_ again. Sitting idly had never been his style. He’d already hurt himself trying to get out before he was supposed to be discharged, and he had paid for it. An extra week stuck in that fucking hospital bed. But Chuck played the role of the good patient and wheeled himself around in the thing because it meant freedom. He couldn’t help but laugh at that. He was still trapped. This cage just had wheels.

The physical therapy was gruelling, especially considering that he had thrown himself into it against the doctor’s recommendations. She told him that he wasn’t ready yet, but left out the part that was plain on her face: it might not even be worth it. But Chuck wasn’t about to give up; he wasn’t done. The pain in his legs was proof of that. If they could feel pain then that was enough to tell him that they weren’t completely gone.  They just didn’t last as long as he’d like. Half way through the day he was forced to drop the crutches and collapse back into the chair. Too bad the thing was never around when he needed it. Having to be supported, by Raleigh Becket of all people, after landing on his face was not an experience he wanted to repeat. But he didn’t always get what he wanted.

There were only so many times he could hit the floor, and only so many times he could be pulled back up before something else broke in him. Who knew there was still something left of him to break?

He remembered falling. Remembered the pain that flared up and spread throughout his body like wildfire until he was burning all over. Remembered fighting against the helping hands. Remembered screaming at him and throwing things until he had retreated and left him there on the floor to pick himself up. The fact that he had been followed at a not so subtle distance on his slow and agonising journey back to his room only rubbed salt into Chuck’s searing wounds.

After fighting so hard to escape the confines of his hospital room, he found himself isolated and locked away in his bunk. All but barricaded the door and ignored anyone that came knocking; Max’s whines and the scratching of his paws at the door were the hardest. Eventually the knocks ceased as the days went on, and though Chuck knew that they would, he still couldn’t help but miss them. He knew that eventually they would stop fighting, but that didn’t stop the tightness in his chest that he hadn’t expected to be there when they did.

*

All eyes were on him as he entered the cafeteria. He and the old man talked, or more accurately argued, but as far as human interaction went these days he was down to zero. Chuck had become a pariah. Again. He saw Becket and Mori across the hall; knew their eyes were on him as he hobbled along, supported by crutches rather than the damned chair, and picked an empty table as far away from them as he possibly could. He wasn’t blind to the glances that kept coming his way from just about everyone in the room. He wasn’t deaf to the hushed whispers and murmuring. The wide berth they all gave him wasn’t lost on him either. And he definitely noticed the final fleeting look Becket and Mori gave him before leaving, without even trying to check in on him like they used to.

So be it. Chuck had never been the social type anyway. He didn’t need to start making best friends forever with anyone now. He’d gotten this far without anyone but Max and his old man. He hadn’t expected either of them to come over anyway. _He’d_ been the one to avoid them after all and _he’d_ been the one to push them away. This suited him just fine.

Looking down at the food on his tray, he realised that his appetite had deserted him all of a sudden.

Chuck heard the tray drop down onto the table opposite his own but didn’t look up at the idiot who thought it was a good idea to join him. He was about to open his mouth to let loose a flurry of insults to drive the unwelcome guest away when he was pre-empted by said guest.

“They’ll never look at you in the same way again, you know.” His guest said in a voice that Chuck recognised but couldn’t quite place. “Not in the way they used to. Nor will they treat you as they did before.”

“You what?” Chuck looked up to see Hermann Gottlieb sitting opposite him with an unreadable expression on his face. He couldn’t recall ever holding an actual conversation with the man before in his entire stay at the Hong Kong Shatterdome. Why in the hell he had chosen to sit there with him was a bigger mystery than why Chuck was even sitting there, alive, in the first place.

“If you’re thinking that this is just a phase,” Gottlieb continued, ignoring Chuck’s glare. “Then I’m afraid that I must tell you that it’s not. Your life is going to be different from now on.”

Chuck snorted. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

Not being able to stand for more than five minutes without a creeping exhaustion and aching settling over him was a pretty damned big difference.

“I’m not just talking about your physical capabilities. This kind of thing affects the mind too.” Gottlieb tapped the side of his head as if to demonstrate.

He was well aware of that fact too. It was something both the old man and his doctor had gone on about over and over again ever since he had been reluctantly discharged from medical. Chuck had put off visiting the ‘Dome’s resident shrink for as long as he could so far, but he knew eventually that either the old man or the doc was going to get him there by any means necessary. They reminded him of the fact that he could no longer outrun either of them. Low fucking blow.

“I don’t remember asking for a therapy session, doc.” Chuck bit back.

“I can assure you that I am not that kind of doctor.” Gottlieb replied.

“Then what the hell are you doing here?” He asked. It wasn’t as if the pair of them had been buddies before all this, and Gottlieb did not strike him as the social type.

“The same as you.” Gottlieb shrugged and started buttering a piece of slightly burned toast. “Eating.”

Chuck looked around. There were plenty of seats available at nearly every table in the cafeteria. Hell, the guy could’ve sat at the other end of Chuck’s and still left him room to eat alone. “Sure you wanna be seen eating with the pariah?”

“I’m no stranger to ostracisation myself.” Gottlieb replied. “I was never blind to the contempt my colleagues held for me, back when I had more than one. And it has never bothered me before.”

“There’s plenty of other tables.” Chuck gestured to them to illustrate his point.

“No one sent me, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

Chuck blinked. He couldn’t remember the last time someone didn’t beat around the bloody bush around him since he had come back. It was like they thought his parts had been replaced with glass by the doctors and now they were all afraid that one wrong move would shatter him to pieces all over again.

He had never needed babysitting before, and he damn well didn’t need it now. But Gottlieb? He had expected Becket or Mori. Hell, even Choi. But this guy? Of all the people the old man could’ve sent, Gottlieb would have been so far down the list that it would have been a wonder he had even made it on there in the first place.

“Hadn’t crossed my mind.” Chuck ground out.

“Of course not.” Gottlieb scoffed.

They fell into an awkward silence. Chuck pushed his food around with his fork. It had gone cold by that point but his desire to eat wasn’t coming back anytime soon. Gottlieb took a bite out of his toast and chewed thoughtfully. Chuck could’ve used that moment to escape. It wasn’t as if he bloody well wanted to stay in the weird as shit situation he had somehow landed himself in, but a sudden twinge in his leg that left him biting his lip to stop from gasping kept him in place.

“Pity.” Gottlieb spoke up again, as if their earlier conversation hadn’t died.  

Chuck stared at him. “What?”

“That’s what you see in their eyes.” He elaborated. “And no matter how much they claim not to, that’s what it is and there is nothing you or anyone can do to change that.”

“I don’t need their fucking pity.” Chuck spat.

He had seen it. That look in their eyes. Becket, Mori, and even the old man. It was the same look for all of them. They felt sorry for him. They pitied the former shell of the man he had become; the helpless bastard who couldn’t fend for himself anymore.

“Of course you don’t but you’re going to get it whether you want it or not. You’ve been damaged and now they see you as less of yourself than you were, whether they mean to or not.” He picked up his cane which had been resting against the edge of the table and turned it over in his hands before tapping it gently against his own leg. “Take it from someone who knows.”

Chuck reached for his coffee and took a long swig. It was stone cold and bitter as hell. They wanted to help him, he knew that much, but it didn’t stop him from feeling like an invalid every time they did. Every time he struggled, every time he fell, one of them was there with that same damned look on their face.

“How the hell do you get them to stop..?” He finally asked in a quiet voice.

“You don’t.” Gottlieb replied.

So this was his life now. Now he was the washed up has been who everyone felt sorry for. What a fucking mess his life had become. Ten kills to ten minutes of standing before his legs gave out on him. “Don’t fucking sugar-coat it, will yah?”

“I don’t know you very well Ranger Hansen, but I do know that you are not a man who would tolerate sugar-coating on anything.”

Chuck’s fists clenched under the table. “Don’t call me that.”

“It’s your title.” Gottlieb remarked.

“It ain’t anymore.”

Ranger. The badge he had once proudly worn pinned to the front of his signature leather jacket: Ranger Hansen. He hadn’t worn the thing since getting out of medical. It was laid out on his bed just where he had left it before heading out for Pitfall. Chuck never took the damned thing off and the old man had joked that it was his second skin. Now it was shoved away under his bed, out of sight. The second he saw it when he stepped into his room he was reminded of that boast: _‘That’s Striker Eureka’s tenth kill to date. It’s new record.’_ A record that would never be topped. A legacy he would no longer live up to. The old man said he should add number 11: the final kill. Chuck had left the jacket untouched. That wasn’t his kill to claim. And who was counting anymore, anyway?

“Are you saying that because the war is over, or because you’re now a cripple?” Gottlieb asked, watching him. Scrutinising him like he was one of his calculations he was trying to figure out.

Chuck opened his mouth but quickly shut it again. It wasn’t often he was left at a loss for words.

“I’m not…” He started.

Not what? Not a cripple? Not helpless? Not able to take a step without some kind of support because he’ll fall flat on his face otherwise? Not able to take his dog on a walk because he can’t even keep up with him anymore? Not able to admit…

“It’s how you see yourself, isn’t it?” Gottlieb saw his eyes wander towards his cane. “It’s how I saw myself. You don’t want to admit it, and you might not ever say it out loud. You think you can do everything yourself still. You _want_ to do everything yourself. You don’t want help. You don’t want to _need_ help. But at the same time you despise yourself, and your body because you _do_ need help and you don’t want to admit that.”

Chuck briefly wondered if Gottlieb was a mind reader. He definitely didn’t peg the bloke as a people person and Chuck didn’t count himself as an open book that anyone could just pick up and read. “Thought this wasn’t a therapy session.”

Hermann chuckled lightly to himself. “Don’t worry, my rates are reasonable.”

He should probably have been pissed at the impromptu therapy session Gottlieb had sprung on him, but honestly he was actually taking a load off that he hadn’t even realised he’d been carrying. Maybe there was something to this whole talking about your feelings crap after all. Who knew? Chuck had never been the type of bloke to spill his guts, but then again he hadn’t exactly come out of Pitfall as the same man who went in. And if he was really honest with himself, he was so goddamned tired. Let this old man talk then.

Chuck rubbed a hand over his face. “He should have let me die.”

There, he’d said it. The one thing he had not allowed himself to say out loud to anyone. The old man would have kicked his arse if he’d heard Chuck utter those words. Pentecost and his mum didn’t die for him to go and throw his life away. He wasn’t allowed to let their sacrifices go in vain. He didn’t get to be selfish like that.

“I thought that too, once.” Gottlieb murmured, looking down into the contents of his mug. “Growing up as the odd one out was not an easy feat. The one who couldn’t keep up with the others. The one left behind or singled out.”

He rested his chin in his hands and looked ahead, beyond Chuck and into some distant space behind him, not in that room. Chuck knew that look. Wore it enough times himself when he was alone with his thoughts. Saw it on the old man when he thought of his mum.

“I wanted to be a pilot too, you know. Jet planes. I was rejected of course. I could have given up. Accepted my limits and let my disability rule my life. But then I would never joined the K-Science division and then where would all of you have been without my calculations and predictions?”

Chuck snorted. “Our saviour.”

“And so are you.” Gottlieb replied.

“Hardly-”

“You’re not forgetting Marshal Pentecost already?” Gottlieb cut him off. “Not a man, woman or child stood alone that day. We all played a part in this war.”

Chuck was never arrogant enough to think otherwise. Sure, he would’ve loved to pilot Striker on his own sometimes. Had the neural load not killed him if he even tried. Striker wouldn’t have even existed for him to pilot if not for the people who had dreamed her up and the techs who kept her running. Chuck had never been above getting his hands dirty and working among Striker’s crew. So part of that had been out of his _‘if you want something done right, do it yourself’_ attitude, but he wasn’t stupid enough to think he could’ve actually done it all himself. The PPDC was a big operation. Bigger than the Jaegers they sent out to battle. And yet, only a small fraction of them went out there and got themselves killed over it.

“So why’d I get booted from Striker then, eh?” Chuck demanded.

“I can’t pretend to understand the man’s motives.” Gottlieb shrugged. “But he never did anything without reason.”

“Pity.” Chuck spat.

“Perhaps.” Gottlieb sighed, caught out by his own words. “Perhaps not. I’m not going to pretend that that is an issue you can fully address in one small conversation either. All we know is that he gave you a second chance. The question is, are you going to waste it?”

Waste it? Chuck could have laughed right in Gottlieb’s face. Waste it? Anyone who knew Chuck – and he was only just starting to realise how small that number really was – knew why he stepped into a Jaeger in the first place. His path had been decided the day his father had picked him over his mother. But that was a different time. There were no Kaiju on their knocking down their door and wrecking the place anymore. What did Chuck do when he didn’t have that anymore?

“If you hadn’t noticed, I’ve already become obsolete.” Chuck said. He gestured to his legs. “With or without this.”

“Then do something else.” Gottlieb retorted.

Chuck blinked. Was this what trying to have a conversation with him was like? He was starting to form a new found appreciation for all the shit the old man put up with. “That’s easy for you to say. Numbers are an easier transferable skill compared to jockeying in a bloody Jaeger.”

“True. I’ve already had an influx of job offers from a number of universities since the breach was closed. Funny how I’ve become popular all of a sudden.” Gottlieb mused. “I’m not here to offer you career advice, Ranger Hansen. You’re perfectly capable of figuring that out for yourself.”

“Good to know people still think I’m capable of something.” Chuck groused. It wouldn’t have come as a surprise if he woke up one morning to find himself wrapped in fucking bubble wrap. Just the way Becket looked at him these days made him feel like he was made of bloody porcelain. He’d punch the guy, but then Becket would probably let him since he thought he couldn’t do any damage anymore.

“They are only limitations if you let them be.” Gottlieb nodded to himself. “Of course there are things you can no longer do, or things that you will need help with. The only thing stopping you is yourself, and going by your history I would not say you are one to admit defeat.”

“Try telling that to the idiots trying to coddle me to death.” Chuck grumbled. He wasn’t sure if he could talk to any of them without the urge to snap at them and break something overcoming him anymore.

“They are trying to help, you know.” Gottlieb said. “Even if they are going about it the wrong way.”

“What, so I’m just supposed to accept their condescending bullshit?” Chuck asked incredulously. Fuck, he really would end up breaking something, or someone, if this really was his life now. And he had thought talking to people had been hard in the past, before all this.

“God no.” Gottlieb shook his head. “Do that and someone of your temperament – of any temperament, really – will eventually snap. They mean well, but you are allowed to call them out on their… bullshit.”

“Although,” Gottlieb continued. “If you do continue to be an ass about it, eventually they will leave you alone.”

Chuck felt his fists clench again. “They’re the ones who need to bloody apologise to _me_.”

“You are an adult are not you? You’re all at fault here.” Gottlieb snapped back. “Honestly. Remind me to have words with your father about your severe lack in manners and social etiquette.”

Chuck let out a harsh laugh. “Look who’s bloody talking.”

He couldn’t remember the last time he cracked a smile, let alone laughed.

“Touché.” Gottlieb conceded. “But even we need to swallow our pride sometimes.”

That was going to be a fun conversation for all involved. He wondered just how long he could actually put it off.

Chuck rolled his eyes. “Let me guess, admitting I need help is the hardest part?”

“Well it’s certainly not easy, but you do also have months of painful physical therapy ahead of you too.” Gottlieb replied.

“Alright, smart arse.” Chuck could’ve sworn he saw the ghost of a smirk on Gottlieb’s lips. So the bastard had a sense of humour after all. One that Chuck of all people could definitely appreciate.

Gottlieb rose from his seat and picked up his cane. “For all of mine and Newton’s… differences, my life would be far grimmer without friends to fall back on. And I am not above admitting that. Not anymore.”

He turned back to regard Chuck before departing. “If this war has taught us anything, Ranger Hansen,” Hermann rose from his seat. “It is that none of us can do this alone.”

Chuck remained seated, staring down at his tray for a long time, as one by one the rest of the people in the cafeteria filed out until he was the last man remaining.

*

Newt had overslept, again. He had woken up in a puddle of his own drool at his desk, again, and rushed towards the cafeteria without checking the time out of fear of missing out on breakfast. More than once he’d snuck into the kitchens to steal food after realising that he’d worked right through the various meal serving times of the day. Thank god for Hermann stocking their shared fridge in the lab with extras he’d grabbed for Newt after getting fed up of listening to him whine about being hungry. Okay, so part of it was to stop him from stealing Hermann’s food too. Who even still labelled their food these days anyway? But Newt was grateful all the same. Still, even he needed to get out of the lab and kick back and talk shop over breakfast.

Too bad Hermann never waited around for him. The guy was up at the crack of dawn every day. It was one of the many things Newt questioned about the guy and whether he was actually human, and not an android. As he flitted into the cafeteria, however, he came to an abrupt stop at the sight before him.

Hermann was sitting at his usual spot in the cafeteria, and sitting opposite him was Chuck Hansen. And they were holding a conversation and– and holy crap was that a laugh from Hermann Gottlieb? From something Chuck Hansen had said? He felt like he had stepped into an episode of _The Twilight Zone._ Maybe he shouldn’t have marathoned so many of them the other night after all.

Still stuck in place, trying to process, he soon found himself joined at the edge of the cafeteria by Mako and Raleigh who like him had stopped to stare at the spectacle in front of them.

“Are you seeing this?” Newt asked.

“Seeing it.” Raleigh replied. “Still working on believing it.”

“This is an interesting and… unexpected turn of events.” Mako remarked.

“Did I miss something?” Newt enquired. “Since when did this become a thing?”

“I think we all did.” Raleigh murmured.

Their collective trance was broken by Chuck who looked up and yelled across the cafeteria at the spectators. “Oi, are you pricks gonna stand there all day gawping or are you gonna sit your arses down?”

Raleigh looked back at Mako and Newt who merely shrugged in response, and the three made their way tentatively over to sit with Chuck and Hermann.

**Author's Note:**

> This was based on an idea I had a while ago about Chuck and Hermann developing an unlikely friendship and bonding over similar experiences concerning disability post Pitfall. While therapy and coming to terms with disability is so important, I could just see Chuck being so reluctant to open up about it without first talking to someone who can actually relate to what he's going through. And well, you can't tell me that there's not a possibility of these two grumps getting along with all their similarities. 
> 
> This ended up as a quick piece written in two days (after having to start again from scratch because my laptop crashed and I lost the original), but I wouldn't mind going back and doing more with it. 
> 
> And you can find me on my [tumblr](http://davecabbage.tumblr.com/) here.


End file.
